


I don't weave, I just stalk through

by Vailee



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Dreamsharing?, F/F, Oddness?, Repetitive Language?, implied depression?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-26
Updated: 2019-02-26
Packaged: 2019-11-05 21:28:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17926670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vailee/pseuds/Vailee
Summary: You stop running.You close your eyes.You flickerand let your glow die.Thenyoufalldown.Down.Down.The darkness swallows you whole.





	I don't weave, I just stalk through

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this weirdness a while ago, never posted it because I didn't like the interaction at the end. But I like the rest of it so... enjoy? It's pretty much all like the summary. Best read on a desktop to help with the excessive use of space.

It’s just a dream.

It’s dark. So, _so_ dark. You blink... and you cannot tell the difference between open and closed. You have been swallowed, devoured, drowned by darkness itself. Without sight, you’re left trying to navigate with your hands but there’s nothing. Nothing to see, nothing to touch, nothing to define yourself by - are you standing? Is there even ground to stand on?

It’s just a dream.

There must be. You must be. You can hear your footsteps. Loud and echoing in the nothingness around you. You step softer, you step harder, no change. You walk slower, you walk faster, no change.

You stop, crouch and reach down.

                                                     And down.

                                                                      And down.

It’s just a dream.

There's something solid under your feet. You can feel the ground underneath you. There is nothing solid under your hands. You reach and reach and reach but you cannot feel the ground under your hands. Just emptiness. You open your mouth. Try to speak, to make noise. Instead, your mouth floods with nothingness. How could this be possible? Your mouth is empty, it’s nothing. Just air. Yet. You’re choking on it. Its stuck in your mouth, your throat, your lungs. You’re silent while choking. You’re silent while spitting. You’re silent while _screaming_.

It’s just a dream.

You know this. You _do._ You are aware of this. You  _are._ It’s at the forefront of your mind.

But

      it’s not your dream.

You can’t control this. You can’t change this. You can’t survive this.

“!!!” Out of the nothingness comes a shout. A scream. You know that voice. It’s her. Your fellow dream traveler. You would _cry_ , you think if you could. If there was enough of you left. Instead you just… exist. Floating in the nothingness.

“!!!” It’s louder. She’s getting closer, ever so close. Close enough? Soon enough? You don’t have time to consider. There’s a hand on your shoulder, the sudden touch shocking in the nothingness you’ve become. She spins you around and you squint at her brightness. She glows. You want to compare her to the sun, but you could stare at her all day and your eyes would be fine. So, you compare her to the moon. It’s more fitting anything, in the darkness that surrounds you. The darkness that is you.

“!!! can you hear me?” She asks, concern saturating her voice. You… can’t find yours. Wordless you nod. “Thank g-uh” She stumbles over the word. There’s something there, you think, some big important reason she won’t say the word god. But you don’t know it, and the thought floats away.

You reach out to touch her, your hand reaching into the light. At first, your hand is just blackness. A silhouette. A stray tendril. Then a hand, your hand, under the darkness. Then, finally skin. Your skin. her skin. Your fingers brush her check. Her other hand comes up and curves around your waist. Drawing you close, into the light.

You press your forehead to hers. Closing your eyes, you can see her glow through your eyelids.

“???” you say. Her name. You know her name, well enough to say but not well enough to comprehend. She is the same. Her hand leaves your shoulder and strokes your hair.

“That was a close one.” She says. You nod.

“You need to be more careful.” She pleads. You nod.

“Please don’t leave me.” She whispers. Your eyes pop open and you meet her stare. You can feel the power of her emotion cradling you. It should be scary. It is scary. but comforting at the same time.

“You don’t even know me.” It’s your turn to whisper.  How can she care this much about someone she’s only ever met in dreams?

“Do you know me?” She asks. You… do. You would do anything for her. Whoever she is. So, beyond your comprehension that you can’t even see her. She was the reason you started coming here. Your savior. Your destruction.

“Yes.”

“Then you understand,” that’s not a question. A statement. You find yourself nodding to anyway. “Do you want to die?” This is a question. Your nodding stops, and you think. The answer is easy.

“No.” Your reply. You do not want to die. But you are not afraid of it. You will face death every night just to get a glimpse of her.

“!!!” she murmurs, before putting her hands on your shoulders and stepping back to stand at arm’s length. You’re not in the darkness anymore. Instead, you stand in what you have come to think of as her house. You know it’s a dining room. With patterned wallpaper, a china cabinet, a table, and chairs. You have examined all these things extensively. But you could not describe any of these things if your life depended on it.

“You are a good dreamer,” she says turning to take a seat at the table. You follow. “Why do you keep letting yourself get stuck there?”

“My specialty is premonitions.” You remind her. “Looking for someone’s specific dream is new to me.”

“Then maybe you should leave that to me?” She asks archly. You smirk. Shrug.

“Can’t get better at it without practice.”

“Even when every time you do so you run the risk of disappearing?” She’s not happy. She brightens. The rest of the room darkens.

“I also need to learn to deal with that.”

“You couldn’t just avoid it? That darkness… it’s not something that happens to everyone. It's unique to you. There may be no way to deal with it.” Unfortunate. And potentially true. But you have knowledge that she doesn’t. Skills she doesn’t. Secrets she doesn’t. You can’t give up. You can’t.

“I’m learning.” You say. Half answering, half deflecting. “I knew it was there from the start.”

“You were less… consumed this time.” She confirms reluctantly. You are delighted. You smile.

The world cracks.

                                                                                                                                                 You wonder what she sees when she looks at you.

                            The roof opens wide.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                               Not your waking self, you know, even if that’s what you see should you glance down now.

                                                              The walls dissolve.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          As always, you’re tempted to ask. To question. To define.

                                                                                            The china cabinet sinks into the ground.

                                                              And, as always, you let the temptation slip away.

                                                                                                                                                           The table disappears.

                                                                                                                                          Some things are better left unasked.

“But you will continue to only call on me while you get this sorted, correct?”

“That’s that plan.”

* * *

Things were not going to plan.

You’ve gotten better. Even made it to ??? without encountering the darkness. You'd planned to have a higher success rate, to try visiting someone else receptive to a dream walker, to know what you were doing. But like everything in your life, in some sort of counterweight to your twin who always has to much time on his hands, you’d run out of time.

You’d taken precautions. Half an hour wasn’t a long time to search for one specific dream of someone you barely knew, but it was almost too long if you failed and got swallowed.

Your footsteps are loud and echoing.

The darkness is there, in the corner of your eye. Shadowing your steps. A silent monstrous specter following behind. But you’re holding it back. It’s your turn to glow. And glow you do.

You’re flickering though. You should be calmer. Surer. More confident. Instead, your heart feels like it’s going to punch out of your chest. Your footsteps are loud, but your breaths are louder. Your thighs ache, exercise is not your thing. Why you wonder, does that have to matter in a dream?

You’re in a stairwell. Endlessly running upstairs. He’s here. You think. Somewhere. But this endlessly looping stairwell is not leading there. You… don’t know how to get out. You get a little bit closer each time you do this. You’re sure you do. But it’s not enough. He’s still lost somewhere in here and you’re stuck endlessly running up these stairs.

Has it been half an hour? You need to wake up. You need to start again. You need to avoid this trap next time. Frustration digs its claws into your sides. You don’t have time for this.

 

You stop running.

You close your eyes.

You flicker

                 and let your glow die.

Then

         you

                f

                 a

                   l

                    l

                      down.

                                 Down.

                                            Down.

The darkness swallows you whole.

 

 

 

 

 

You don’t know when your wakeup call will come.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She’s not here to save you this time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You may be fucked this time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Breathe

Gasp. Wheeze. Splutter.

Breathe.

He is

        BREATH.

                      He is the air in your lungs. He is the wind stopping your fall.

He is Freedom

                       and

                              you

                                    are 

                                          …

Awake.

Goddamn.

* * *

It’s a hallway this time. You can see the door at the end. But no matter how you run, run, run, you never get any closer.

Time passes.

The darkness is here. Still. Again. You can feel it, tendrils touching your arms. Raising the hair on the back of your neck. Surrounding your feet. You feel like you’re running in water. It doesn’t help that the door isn’t getting closer.

Time passes.

Helplessness claws at your throat. You need to get out of here. You need to find him. Her. Them. They’ve been making as much time as they can while you prepared yourself, but it’s run out.

There is no more -

Time passes.

A flicker in the corner of the eye. On your left. How, in this hallway? There is only forwards and backwards. Only the endless, featureless walls. No time to question. You need out. An abrupt change of direction. Throwing yourself to the left you leave the shadows hugging your feet. Hit the wall… and are sunk. You wail. It slips in like oil, runs down your throat.

Time passes.

It’s hopeless.

Until its not.

He is

        HOPE

                  and he is _incandescent_. Brighter than her. Warmer. Stronger. Are those wings? A hand, reaching out, an offering. Will you accept this stranger’s help? He’s not like BREATH. He is not freedom, slipping you out of the darkness, protecting you with the very thing that keeps you alive.

He will not do all the work for you. He will give you what you need. In return, you will work for him. It’s a difficult choice. It’s not even a choice. Accept or decline. Time’s a-ticking. No time for deep introspection. Yes or No.

You reach out.

You touch.

Screeches. Cold, cold light splits off him. Wings flaring, eyes staring, fangs flashing. They tear the darkness from you. His hand pulls you out of the cold blank hands of nothingness

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      and he believes

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               in you

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         and you

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      are

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            LIGHT

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      …

And awake again.

* * *

Third time lucky is the saying. A saying.

You know what to do now. You are LIGHT. Brighter, hotter, stronger. You are the sun. And you burn, burn, burn, away any darkness that comes near you. You speed through the dreamscape. Running, flying? There is no space to move through. There is lots of space to look through.

You are searching for something cold and dark. The feeling of something watching you when you’re alone. The sound of footsteps behind you on a dark late night. The shadow of someone taller, stronger and infinitely more dangerous than you could ever be. You are searching for the end of hope. The feeling that marks bad times ahead.

You think of your sister. It’s not the same, her particular type of nothingness is not dark or cold. But it is the closest ending you know. The closest you can compare it with, without letting the darkness in. Letting it confuse and obscure.

You come up empty handed. New strategy. This isn’t working.

You take your LIGHT

                                and you SEE.

You KNOW him.

Seer to mage. Guider to actor. Knowing to knower.

And you find him.

So, _so_ Cold. Suffocating. Unfeeling.

This is

           DOOM.

He’s there. Green and Black. Hard and spiked. Cold as death.

There’s another here as well. Red, red, red. Cogs and wheels and machinery. Slowly, oh so slowly ticking forward.

Slo w  I  n    g

                      TIME.

“Aradia?” It’s… odd. With ???, you know her dreamscape self well but have no idea who she is in the waking world. With Aradia it is the opposite. You know her from the waking world. Not well, admittedly. Just that she’s asked you for help. You’ve never seen her in the dreamscape before.

“Rose,” she replies. A form coalesces from the red. She looks like she does in the waking world. Though that is not an outfit you've seen her wear. Seen anybody wear. “Thank you for coming.” She’s smiling. Her relaxed tone belied by the tension in her body.

“So,” you say turning your attention to DOOM. To Sollux. “How can I help?” Aradia’s smile slips a little as she turns to her friend.

“You’re a seer. You can KNOW right?” She asks. Her question, you think, would make no sense if you weren’t in the dreamscape. If you couldn’t feel the weight. The power in the word. KNOW. You come closer. Reaching out through the red, red, red and into the cold. You shiver. The hair on the back of your neck stands to attention. Your nerves scream at you. This is wrong, wrong, wrong.

You dismiss it.

Closing your eyes, you take your LIGHT

                                                             and you

                                                                          KNOW.

 

The soon-to-be-dead scream. They cry. They howl. They are DOOMED. In their misery and pain, they DOOM you.

But you don’t have to be DOOMED. You just have to KNOW.

Do you really think that makes any fucking difference?

It makes a difference to Aradia.

The soon-to-be-dead scream. And scream. And scream. On and on into infinity. Or your death. Do they still scream if there is no one to hear them? How can you live like this? You heard her. You heard Aradia screaming before she died-

What?

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          -and now you just want to let go. Give up. Disintegrate.

Aradia is alive

She died

She’s the one who asked me to help you. She’s the one who’s been keeping you from self-destructing.

Aradia?

“Sollux?”

How? I _heard_  you. I _saw_ you.

“Sollux. Your body's in the hospital wasting away because you’ve banished your mind to the dreamscape to be eaten by the voices of the soon-to-be-dead. Not even ghosts, but the voices of people _still alive_. I’m by your bedside slowing down time to keep you from dying. Rose is in her own house talking to you in your head from the dreamscape because the two of you have flipped powers and you think I couldn’t overcome a little death?”

The soon-to-be-dead scream. None of them familiar. They all blend together into one grating shriek. You feel like your brain is going to melt in your skull. Not a quick death. But if you’re that far along maybe it won’t take much more.

Why are you doing this? Aradia is alive.

Do you think that just fixes everything?

No. But I think it’s a damn good incentive for you to try to, at least, soothe the worst.

The soon-to-be-dead scream.

I should be happy. Aradia is alive. But I'm just... numb.

I suppose in your situation it would be hard to feel anything else.

I don’t want to hurt Aradia. But I don’t want to…

Live?

Do anything. Put any _effort_ into living.

I can't force you to do anything. I can't force change upon this situation. But... I want to help. Aradia wants to help. Your family wants to help. We all want you alive. But… we can’t do that without you taking the first step. Without you trying.

The soon-to-be-dead scream. Forever and ever and ever and ever and they will

                                                                                                                           just

                                                                                                                                  not

                                                                                                                                        SHUT UP.

Fine! How do I get out of here?

The soon-to-be-dead scream. You are the soon-to-be-dead. They are DOOM. You are DOOM. It is cold and dark and grating and - Bright, bright LIGHT. Sunny and shiny and lucky. Reaching out. They KNOW things. They KNOW the LIGHT while you KNOW DOOM. You reach out and touch and you 

                                                                KNOW.

 

The DOOM coalesces into humanoid form. You know his name, but you’ve never seen him in the waking world. He is a spikey black skeleton moving oh so slowly amidst Aradia’s red, red, red. Then it’s gone.

“You did it.” Aradia cheers. You smirk at her.

“Of course.” You reply, maybe a touch too arrogantly. She glances at the space that used to hold Sollux’s dream self.

“Well, I’m going to wake up and have a _long_ conversation with him. I’ll see you some other time Rose.” She waves and fades away.

You close your eyes.

 

You open your eyes.

A face hovers over yours. Red eyes peer at you over ever-present sunglasses.

“You’re awake,” the relief is palatable. “It went well?” You smile.

“Yes.” One life saved. One life revivified. Ten lives to go.

 

 


End file.
